Did You Know Britney Spears Was in a Girl Group Before Hitting It Big?

07/25/2024 03:32 PM

Following the success of *NSYNC and Backstreet Boys, disgraced manager Lou Pearlman also created a girl group, Innosense

Before Britney Spears skyrocketed to fame releasing "…Baby One More Time" in 1998, she was an early addition to the girl group Innosense. 

In episode two of Netflix's Dirty Pop: The Boy Band Scam, which chronicles the rise and fall of Lou Pearlman, his former artist rep Melissa Moylan talks about some of the disgraced manager's other bands outside of *NSYNC, Backstreet Boys and O-Town.

One of the bands she mentions is Innosense, a girl group created in the late 1990s.

"Britney was in the Innosense band and then she left to become a solo artist," Moylan explains. 

Following Spears' departure, the band featured singers Danay Ferrer, Mandy Ashford, Nikki DeLoach, Veronica Finn and Amanda Latona. 

Related: Who Was Lou Pearlman? All About the Con Man Behind Your Favorite Boy Bands

In a 2002 New York Times Magazine profile of Latona, who is now a fitness influencer and was featured on Shark Tank, journalist Lynn Hirschberg wrote that Innosense "was designed to be an American version of the Spice Girls."

Latona would also later leave the band to go solo, and was replaced by Jenny Morris, PopSugar reported. 

In 2019, YouTube released another documentary highlighting Pearlman's controversial work titled The Boy Band Con: The Lou Pearlman Story. Along with many other entertainers who worked with Pearlman, DeLoach opened up about her experience in the band. 

"The feeling of being a girl band in the midst of all these boy bands was, we felt like super special," the former Mickey Mouse Club cast member recalled. "They were talking about us being like the next *NSYNC and the next Backstreet Boys."

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer​​, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. 

When it came time to sign their contract, however, DeLoach recalled a warning given to her by her entertainment attorney. 

"You will be committing career suicide if you sign this," she remembered being told. Nevertheless, the young star signed the contract. 

"When you look back at your life, there were a lot of signs that said 'Yes, do this' and there were a lot of signs that said 'No, don't' and I jumped," she said.  

Related: *NSYNC's Chris Kirkpatrick Says Former Manager Lou Pearlman 'Always' Asked Him to Keep Band a Secret 'in the Beginning'

Toward the end of the documentary, DeLoach revealed that with the news of Pearlman's death in 2016 she felt "a lot of relief."

"Because I felt like he terrorized me for a while," she continued, after previously alleging in the documentary that Pearlman filmed her and other women in the nude as they used the tanning bed in his home and showed the footage to "all the boys" without their knowledge.

Innosense released one album, So Together, in 2000 featuring the songs "Say No More," "This Is It" and "A Hundred Oceans." Spears went on to release nine studio albums, earning eight Grammy nominations and one win along the way.

Pearlman, who managed other groups including LFO, Take 5, Natural, Marshall Dyllon, US5, Solid HarmoniE and artists including Aaron Carter and Jordan Knight, was charged with conspiracy, money laundering and making false claims in bankruptcy in 2007. He died in federal prison in 2016 following his 2008 sentence of 25 years.

Dirty Pop: The Boy Band Scam is streaming now on Netflix.

For more People news, make sure to sign up for our newsletter!

Read the original article on People.